The File-Sharing Debates: "Why do the publishers and movie studios let the library get away with it? For that matter, why don't they object to the Blockbusters of the world, who let people rent movies by the millions?’   “The answer is, ‘Because they don’t have a choice.’

Copyright law requires copyright holders to give up their ability to control distribution of those works once they have put them into the stream of commerce. This principle, commonly referred to as the ‘first sale doctrine,’ is codified in Section 109 of the Copyright Act. The first sale doctrine gives libraries and video retailers the right to rent and sell prerecorded videos and video games without the authorization of the copyright holder.” 

Hmm. I wonder if a vendor supplied a tivo-like Internet appliance, and did a Netflix-type subscription service, so my in-house appliance always had a certain limited amount of digital content ready to go.  The appliance network vendor could prove that only an exact limited number of copies of any given work was in appliances at any one time. 

  6:37:40 AM